The brief: The Income Specialists (TIS), a newly re-branded organisation, needed a communications strategy to reach its target audience - retired investors - and educate them about the product offering while separating TIS from the clutter created by other much larger asset managers against whom TIS could never compete.
The approach: Corpcom's solution was to conduct robust research into the South African retired investor, to understand them better as a target audience and more specifically their needs and concerns regarding investing for their retirement. An independent reputable research house was commissioned to research this market and the sample had to be representative of the universe of investors that TIS wished to target i.e. retired people with monthly income requirements between R5 000 and R20 000.
With this deep level of understanding of their needs and concerns regarding investing for retirement and also an understanding of their lifestyle as retirees, TIS was able to authoritatively interact with this target audience around addressing these investment needs and to alleviate their concerns.
Aside from publicity, Corpcom also set up a number of face to face events around the country where the TIS asset managers could speak directly to retirees – the research had shown that retirees needed to "stare into the whites" of asset managers' eyes to trust them with their money. The venues for these events were garden centres nationally, as the research had shown that gardening was the favourite pastime of retirees. In line with this pastime, gardening guru Keith Kirsten was appointed to address retirees at these events, talking about various gardening topics followed by a brief presentation by TIS on their philosophy of managing money.
The result: The formula worked. In the five years after the research was conducted which positioned TIS as asset managers who could provide certainty of income for retirees, the assets under management at TIS grew from a few hundred thousand to over R20bn. This was achieved with a limited marketing budget which included the research; most of the emphasis was on publicity and face to face interaction with a niche target audience.
Thanks to the research, Corpcom had sufficiently good content to write articles for every major and minor publication in SA which sought to address these retirees' concerns and so position TIS as an asset manager who understood this market and could assist them. The content was sufficient to be used for more than two years. The client achieved publicity worth five times the value of their investment in the research. This excludes the value the client has derived from every presentation they gave to their target audience as well as the value they derived from creating appropriate products to meet the needs of the retired investor.
"Corporate Communications Consultants' ability to convert an idea and information into readable, useful content that can be disseminated through the correct media to educate and communicate to our market is greatly appreciated." ~ Marc Thomas, Marketing Director (2001-7), The Income Specialists
